Record Your Shows ON TIME! (Windows XP)

[pdaughe]

There are two primary factors that affect whether a show is recorded "on time":

1. The show has to be broadcast on time, and
2. The computer's clock must be accurate.

Variance in either of these can be compensated for by using "Padding." In Beyond TV 4, padding defaults to two minutes.

The first factor is beyond our control. However, the impact of the second factor can be minimized.

The Windows time service, W32Time, synchronizes the computer's clock with an Internet time service provider.

The questions are: when and how often?

By default, a Windows XP client computer (i.e. stand-alone or not a member of a Domain network) synchronizes with the time service provider once a week (if a computer is a member of a Domain, the default is every hour). The time of day when the synchronization occurs is determine by adding 7x24 hours to the last time the clock was successfully synchronized (including a manual update). In Windows XP, you can easily observe this behavior:

Display the Date & Time Control Panel (double-click on the time shown on the bottom-right of the screen) and select the Internet Time tab. Click "Update Now" and note the message indicating when the next synchronization will occur.

It seems reasonable that the default synchronization period is one week. The time on the typical home computer is not that critical and I suppose Microsoft doesn't want to over-tax the time server provider.

HOWEVER, it is interesting to note that the default on Windows MCE with Roll-up 2 is one day, not one week. Obviously, the computer's time is indeed more critical to HTPC's.

YOU can have your share of the time provider's service too:

Registry Entry: SpecialPollInterval
Path: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\W32Time\TimeProviders\NtpClient

This entry specifies the special poll interval in seconds. The default value on domain members is 3,600 (one hour). The default value on stand-alone clients is 604,800 (one week).

Change it to 86,400 (one day) to synchronized the computer's clock daily. You can see the affect of the change by manually updating the time as described above -- the next time synchronization will be 24 hours from the current time as opposed to one week (I don't recall if the computer has to be re-booted after the registry change -- just don't remember.)

A good time to do this would be around 6:00 P.M. before the evening recordings begin!

How important this is to you depends. If you view the event log and see entries for W32Time, you may be missing synchronizations (the service attempts to collect time samples a limited number of times during a polling interval). If the computer's clock is not synchronized for two or three weeks in a row, the time can easily get several minutes off. I experienced this "phenomenon" on one computer and after making the above registry change on all the computers, the time is ALWAYS the same on each machine, and most importantly, we haven't miss the beginning or ending of a show since!

There are lots of (mind-spinning) articles on the Windows time service. I know the polling interval can also be set for Windows 2000, but I didn't follow through those registry changes. For Windows XP users whom are uncomfortable with editing the Windows registry, you can also use the Group Policy editor to effect the changes. It is easy to find the Microsoft Knowledge Base article that documents the procedure in detail.

Happy Recording!

Paul

[weezer1024]

Nice post, and a good idea for anyone using any sort of recording software.

Personally I've found the Windows built in NTP client to be pitiful. It very often times out on the NTP sync call and takes forever just to complete a single synch. I've been using Thinking Man's Dimension 4 NTP client for years now without issue. http://www.thinkman.com/dimension4/index.htm

Far easier than the windows client and it too runs as a service. You can update ever 15 minutes if you so choose.

[Eric3a]

Under Win2000.
I use Atomic Clock Sync.

http://www.snapfiles.com/freeware/ne...wtimesync.html

Eric

[Cal]

I'll add a vote for Dimension 4.

My computer will drift from correct time by a couple minutes a week.

I had modified my reg stuff to be more often and still had problems. I find that Microsofts default time servers are not very accurate and can be off by a minute or two.

Thats not a big deal for most people but is a huge issue for anyone using a computer as a PVR. I installed D4 and just left it at all default settings. My time issues went away.

[DonK]

Argosoft makes a free time server client that runs as a service. That's what I use.

[karhill]

Originally Posted by weezer1024

Nice post, and a good idea for anyone using any sort of recording software.

Personally I've found the Windows built in NTP client to be pitiful. It very often times out on the NTP sync call and takes forever just to complete a single synch. I've been using Thinking Man's Dimension 4 NTP client for years now without issue. http://www.thinkman.com/dimension4/index.htm

Far easier than the windows client and it too runs as a service. You can update ever 15 minutes if you so choose.

I've had good luck with Windows built in NTP client on XP and Server 2003. But you do have to configure the service to use something other than the default Microsoft time servers, which are not that reliable.

[Zogg]

I use the small utility here to adjust the interval of Windows built-in NTP client: http://www.dougknox.com/xp/utils/xp_inet_time.htm

No registry hacking or counting seconds necessary!

Enjoy,
Z

[darren_e]

A more accurate server for time is-

time.nist.gov

Instead of using windows to rely on time, this government time server works quite well.

[hadlyme]

SymmTime is free, small and easy to configure.

This NTP client can be found at download.com.

[Eric3a]

Magic! I just noticed XP's time server check is a weekly affair so I gave the search function a go and there you are!
Thanks for the tip.
Eric